Wednesday, February 02, 2011

PC Magazine’s Neil Rubenking has published a couple more reviews of security suites to the dozen Internet Security Suite 2011 reviews he published during the last few months of 2010, Kaspersky Pure Total Security, and Outpost Security Suite Free 7.0

Kaspersky Pure Total Security –Rubenking gave 4 stars to Kaspersky Pure Total Security, writing that the product “has everything in a suite, plus much, much more.” The product scored poorly compared to its competitors against keyloggers. Given that it received four stars, people contemplating a purchase should check out the review of this product as well as some of his other to rated security suites. To view the complete review, go to http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2378961,00.asp

Otherwise, in brief, Kaspersky Pure Total Security adds home network control, remote management of Parental Control, Password Manager, Scheduled Automatic Data backup, Encrypted Data Vaults, and File Shredder to the Internet Security 2011 suite.Outpost Security Suite Free 7.0 - Outpost Security Suite Free 7.0 received 3 stars out of 5 from Rubenking. This was a higher score than a number of paid security suites. Interestingly enough, Outpost’s paid suite received only 2.5 stars from Rubenking. In the end, he recommended choosing this free suite only if you wanted a complete free package and didn’t want to create your own suite. http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2375624,00.asp

A table listing both PC World’s and PC Magazine’s top Internet Security suites for 2011 is at http://kensek.blogspot.com/2010/12/pc-world-battle-of-security-superpowers.html Kaspersky Pure Total Protection has not been added to this yet.

Create Your Own Free Internet Security Suite?

An obvious advantage of creating your own free suite is the price. However, you’ll be relying on volunteers and FAQ’s for support. Then there’s the classic best of breed separate components versus a free (or paid) integrated solution conundrum.

Mary Landesman wrote a column last year on how to put together a free internet security suite. She listed six components a suite should have and provided links to suggested companies to obtain these from. The six components are antivirus, antispyware (this is often part of an antivirus product), firewall, spam filters, antiphishing filter, and popup blocker. People going this route may want to download and install McAfee Site Advisor or AVG Technologies LinkScanner to provide additional protection while surfing the web. http://antivirus.about.com/od/freeantivirussoftware/a/securitysuite.htm?nl=1